Sibylla looked round cautiously, and sunk her voice. "Could Tynn or his wife have done anything with it? You say they were present when it was signed."
"Most decidedly they did not. Both of them were anxious that I should succeed."
"It is so strange! To lock a paper up in a desk, and for it to disappear of its own accord! The moths could not have got in and eaten it?"
"Scarcely," smiled Lionel. "The day before your aunt died, she—"
"Don't talk of that," interrupted Mrs. Massingbird. "I will hear about her death to-morrow. I shall be ill if I cry much to-night."
She sank into silence, and Lionel did not interrupt it. It continued, until his quick ears caught the sound of the groom's return. The man rode his horse round to the stables at once. Presently Tynn came in with a note. It was from Lady Verner. A few lines, written hastily with a pencil:—
"I do not understand your request, Lionel, or why you make it. Whatever may be my opinion of Frederick Massingbird's widow, I will not insult her sense of propriety by supposing that she would attempt to remain at Verner's Pride now her aunt is dead. It is absurd of you to ask me to come; neither shall I send Decima. Were I and Decima residing with you, it would not be the place for Sibylla Massingbird. She has her own home to go to."
There was no signature. Lionel knew his mother's handwriting too well to require the addition. It was just the note that he might have expected her to write.
What was he to do? In the midst of his ruminations, Sibylla rose.
"I am warm now," she said. "I should like to go upstairs and take this heavy shawl off."